Winterlong

by Mason Cross

  Carlson nodded again, but his smile was gone. He stood up, and I noticed that there were two plain manila file folders on his desk: one thick, one thin. He reached down and picked the thin file up. There was no label on the cover. He opened it and leafed through a couple sheets of paper.

  “Says here you’ve been working for Uncle Sam for the last six years. Overseas Personnel Planning. Nice salary. Lots of foreign travel. Pretty cushy position, by the looks of it.”

  “It’s harder than it looks.”

  “Oh, I don’t doubt that. I don’t doubt that at all. Because this is all bullshit.”

  He closed the folder and slapped it on the desk, staring back down at me.

  “Why don’t you tell me about what you really do,” he said. “Why don’t you tell me about Winterlong?”

  6

  SUNNYVALE, CALIFORNIA

  After leaving the Moonola building, I took another cab back into the center of Sunnyvale and found a quiet coffee shop. I ordered a large cup of black coffee and read through Scott Bryant’s employee file. There wasn’t a great deal to read.

  It contained the things you’d expect from any company: Bryant’s resume, submitted on his application for the job; his sickness and vacation record; details of his salary and benefits. As you’d expect from a company that employed highly skilled technicians, it also contained the successful results of his selection and evaluation tests. And as you’d expect from a company that developed a highly marketable and attractive product that could be stored on a flash drive, there was also a background report. As Greg from Moonola would no doubt have pointed out: A lot of good that did.

  It looked as though the agency that had been commissioned to look into Bryant’s background had done a reasonably thorough job. His employment history and educational qualifications were bona fide, matching exactly with what he’d put on the resume. Bryant had graduated in the top five percent of his class at Stanford, and had worked for four other Silicon Valley tech companies at steadily increasing pay grades and levels of expertise prior to joining Moonola. I didn’t recognize the names of any of the four other companies, but I assumed they all had colorful fonts and probably some anthropomorphized animal as part of their logo. A financial check showed he had no significant credit card debts at that time, and that he didn’t appear to owe anything but a sizable mortgage on a property out in Palo Alto. Was there such a thing as a non-sizable mortgage, these days?

  That led smoothly into an evaluation of his personal life. Again, no obvious red flags. Married for four years at that point to Jasmine Mary Bryant, a thirty-one-year-old botanist whom he’d met while at Stanford. They had one child: a four-year-old girl named Alyssa.

  The one question mark was over a six-month gap in his resume. Bryant had taken a sabbatical from the company he was working for at that point, picking up early the following year just before he moved to another company. The report noted that when questioned about it at the Moonola interview, he said they had briefly relocated to Seattle while Jasmine’s mother was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer. When the mother-in-law got the all clear, they came back to Palo Alto.

  Aside from that, there was absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. A stable, ordinary, professional guy. So what had gone wrong?

  I remembered Stafford mentioning that Bryant had split from his wife. Actually, he had thought Bryant was single at first, then remembered “something about an ex-wife.” I wondered how recent that was; thought about calling Stafford and then decided it was unlikely he’d have paid enough attention to Bryant’s personal life to know. Besides, there was an easier way to check.

  I leafed back to the personnel details and checked the address. The house in Palo Alto was there as the initial home address from the time of his recruitment, but there was an amendment about six months ago. Bryant had moved from what Google informed me was a good-sized three-bedroom detached house in an affluent suburban area to a one-bedroom condo in Monte Sereno. Still a nice place, in a desirable Silicon Valley commuter town within a half hour’s drive of Moonola.

  So six months ago, something had happened that had meant Bryant had moved out of the family home and into a place of his own. The cops had already given the condo a once-over, according to the report. I wondered if they had checked out the previous address. Given the lackadaisical approach Stafford had complained about, I thought it was worth the cab fare to Palo Alto to find out.

  I picked up the sheaf of papers, tapped them square, and tucked them back into the plastic wallet Stafford’s receptionist had provided. I finished my coffee and took my phone out. I tapped into recent calls and scrolled to a number saved under the letter C. I tapped again and listened to the electronic ringtone. It would be midafternoon in Florida, and I wondered if Coop would be in the bar already.

  There wasn’t really an accurate description for what Coop did, but agent probably came closest. Or perhaps broker. He was the guy people talked to when they wanted something done. He was the guy who could contact people like me, or whoever was most appropriate to the job at hand. Our relationship was based on a carefully balanced combination of mutual trust and “don’t ask.” I didn’t know too much about him or how he came to be so well connected, and he didn’t ask too much about me. He had no more than a vague idea about where I hung my hat, and I was supposed to know only that he was based somewhere in Florida. It had been Coop who had referred me to Stafford, for his usual modest commission.

  The ring cut out, and I heard distant traffic noise.

  “How’d it go?”

  I smiled. Straight to the point, as always. “Good. I think I have somewhere to get started.”

  “Glad to hear it,” Coop replied, his already-gravelly tones betraying the onset of a cold. “I’ll process the up-front, and you can let me know when you deliver.”

  “Your confidence in me is inspiring.”

  He chuckled. “I don’t think this is going to be one of your tougher assignments, Blake. A computer nerd on the run? What’s the worst that could happen?”

  I shook my head. “Stop it.”

  “Stop what?”

  “Tempting fate. You know what I say: There’s always—”

  “‘Always something you don’t know,’” he finished. “Anyone ever tell you you’re one of life’s pessimists?”

  “You know what the Russians say about that?”

  “About what?”

  “They say that a pessimist is a well-informed optimist.”

  “Cute.”

  I smiled. “Take care of that cold, Coop. It’s chilly out there.”

  “Not in Florida.”

  “Even in Florida.”

  We exchanged goodbyes and I hung up, looking back at the file photo of Scott Bryant. It was an upper-body shot of an African-American man in his midthirties, slightly over-weight, with close-cropped hair and a neat beard. He wore rimless glasses and a burnt-orange short-sleeve shirt and was flashing a wide grin for the camera. The impression was someone who was pleasant and friendly and a little nerdy. The picture was as unassuming and nonthreatening as the information in the background check.

  But the background check had reinforced an entirely false impression. I wondered if the photograph would, too.

  7

  SOUTH OF PORTLAND, OREGON

  It was torturous, keeping to fifty in the slow lane, but Scott Bryant knew it was worth the frustration to make sure he wasn’t stopped. The car itself—a blue ’07 Pontiac, bought cash via a pseudonymous eBay account—wouldn’t give the highway cops cause to stop him, but if he was pulled over for speeding, he would be forced to show his driver’s license, or claim he didn’t have one with him. Either one would spell trouble. So although the pace was frustrating, it was necessary.

  He still had plenty of time, anyway. The buy was set up for tomorrow morning at eleven. A little less than twenty-four hours, now.

  After that it would all be over and he’d be on his way to ... someplace else. He hadn’t decided where yet. Th
at wasn’t due to a lack of planning. He had been meticulous about every detail of what he needed to do from now until tomorrow morning at eleven.

  Getting into the server room to swipe a copy of MeTime and then leaving without being challenged had been the most difficult part. Unfortunately, it had been impossible to cover his tracks for long. It was inevitable that they would have discovered his crime by now. He wondered if they had gone to the cops immediately. He had a hunch that Stafford wouldn’t want to, but even if he did, he had cleared the apartment in Monte Sereno out a week ago. The only other connection he had in California was Jasmine, and she wouldn’t be able to tell them anything useful.

  The thought of her triggered a nauseous feeling of guilt in the pit of his stomach. He had thought about calling her to tell her about what he was going to do. He had wanted to, but deep down he knew it was better this way. If this didn’t work out, it was all on him, and that was the way it needed to be, for all their sakes. But a part of him wondered what she would have said anyway.

  So far, everything was going to plan. He had tried to leave nothing to chance. He had cut his credit cards up and put them in the trash. He’d wiped the data on his old cell phone and then smashed it and tossed it into the storm drain at the bottom of his street for good measure. He had a new set of clothes, a new prepay phone, and enough cash for unexpected emergencies. He had food and bottles of water for the journey. He had twenty dollars in singles for tolls. He had planned out every detail from walking out of Moonola yesterday right up until eleven a.m. tomorrow at Wakey’s Diner. At 11:05, he’d be leaving with two million dollars in cash, walking a hundred yards across the street to the bus station, and beginning his new life.

  What happened after that was a mystery even to him. Deliberately so. It was as though it would be tempting fate if he made concrete decisions beyond the culmination of his plan. On a rational level, he knew it was dumb. He remembered how Jasmine had teased him about his superstitions: that somebody who worked with the hard and fast certainties of technology could be in thrall to such primitive instincts. Don’t walk under ladders. Step on a crack, break your mother’s back.

  Never enter through the front door. Never count your money when you’re playing. Never accept the winnings in fifties.

  He knew superstition wasn’t related to the part of him that was good at his day job. It was an intrinsic element of the other side of him. The one he had known to keep hidden from Jasmine until it was impossible to hide it any longer.

  It was funny. For the first time, the two halves of his life had come together, because this was the highest-stakes gamble he would ever make in his life. The highest stakes he would ever play, for the biggest payoff.

  For some reason he thought about the guy who had sold him the Pontiac last night: a short, nervous-looking guy who introduced himself only as “Bill.” According to Bryant’s instructions, Bill had delivered the car to an empty parking lot. After Bryant had checked the car over to make sure the tires and lights were all fine, Bill had accepted eight hundred and fifty dollars for the transaction—eight hundred for the car, fifty for delivery. After they had shaken hands, Bill had tapped his shirt pocket, just to make sure the money was still there. Just then, Bryant did the same thing, making sure the MeTime flash drive was still there.

  In twenty-four hours ... less than twenty-four hours, it would all be over.

  8

  NEW YORK CITY

  “Close the door behind you,” Faraday said without looking up.

  She kept her eyes on the report on her screen as Murphy entered the office and took his time getting comfortable in the chair in front of her desk. He unbuttoned his jacket and sat back. He was too damned comfortable in her presence. The other men made sure to respect her position, even Usher in his creepy, monosyllabic way. But Murphy treated her as though they were equals. They were not.

  “I think that went pretty well,” he said, in the tone of a husband congratulating his wife after a successful dinner party.

  Finally, she closed the window on her screen and let her eyes meet his. “I’m uncomfortable with this, Murphy.”

  “You were okay about it when it was Crozier.”

  “That was very different and you know it. That was reacting to a live situation—this is preemptive.”

  “Never heard that raised as a problem around here before.”

  She said nothing, just fixed him with a stare, until he smiled apologetically.

  “You really do want to do things differently, huh? That wasn’t just a hard-ass new boss act, was it?”

  “I don’t act, Murphy. And I think we’re way past me being the new anything. I realize it’s important for your ego to pretend this is still a boys’ club, and that’s why I indulge you, to a point. Drakakis was sloppy. He let men like Crozier and Blake run wild. I’m not going to make that mistake, but it doesn’t mean I want to rush into anything.”

  “Who’s rushing? It took us months to get this close. Without this new lead, we’d be chasing dead ends for the next year.”

  Faraday didn’t rise to the bait. Murphy’s reference to dead ends was a veiled dig. Faraday had wanted to focus on pinning down Blake’s base before they made a move against him. From the painfully few confirmed sightings, there was a hypothesis that he was based somewhere on the East Coast. They had a few promising angles of investigation, but so far nothing had panned out. Not until one of the many lines they put out had been tugged, giving them a live and time-sensitive opportunity.

  Perhaps Murphy had a point, though. In the year or so since she had taken over, she had been entirely comfortable with the vast majority of decisions she had made, the reforms she had implemented. She knew that she was grudgingly accepted by the men, even if none of them warmed to her personally. She couldn’t care less about that, so long as they respected her.

  But if she had a legitimate shot at a genuine threat and didn’t take it ... Well, then the whispers would start. Perception was everything, and she knew Murphy wouldn’t hesitate to use that against her if he didn’t get his way on this. She sensed he wanted Blake bad, for whatever reason. There was more to it than he was telling, she was sure, but that didn’t change the fact that Blake could be very dangerous indeed if the truth ever came to light. So on balance, it was worth going ahead, even if she wasn’t entirely comfortable.

  “This is the time,” Murphy said again, a flicker of concern in his eyes suggesting that he was worried she might be changing her mind. “We remove Blake and that’s it. No one will ever know what really happened to the senator.”

  Faraday bristled. Even now she couldn’t quite believe it. That one of their own operatives had murdered a US senator and his wife in revenge for a botched deal to leak sensitive files. Drakakis, her predecessor, had acted quickly to protect the operation. An Iraq veteran with mental health issues named Evan Froelich had been put in the frame for the assassination and conveniently found dead by his own hand shortly thereafter. They had made efforts to track down Blake and his accomplice back then, of course, but luck and training had allowed them to slip the net. In any case, they had known that it was in the interests of both men to lay low and not make ripples. If that changed, they could be dealt with later. Later had finally come.

  Jesus. If there was ever a need to demonstrate why a change in the regime had been necessary, the Carlson assassination had been it. Two dead civilians, a murderous loose end, and an extremely risky cover-up. She cursed Drakakis for putting her into this position, where the only tenable solution was to finish what he had started. It wasn’t the way she worked, but it had to be done. Martinez had been dealt with already. Now there was only one remaining loose end, one last snip.

  “I don’t want any blowback on this, Murphy. Is that clear?”

  He leaned forward in his chair, his expression suddenly serious, all business. “I have a good team in place for this. We do, I mean. Once we move on the connection in Orlando, we’ll have everything in place no matter where Blake is hi
ding. It’s going to be clean and quiet. Surgical.”

  The assurance given, Murphy sat back and smiled again, baring his teeth. All of a sudden Faraday decided Usher’s dead-eyed stare wasn’t so bad after all. To avoid looking at him, she glanced at her screen and clicked to open Cornell Stark’s file. Two photographs at the top of the screen: one from his army days, one more recent. In contrast with Carter Blake, Stark had barely changed in the four-year gap between the images. He had close-cropped, reddish hair, dark, thoughtful eyes, and an identical, focused expression in both pictures. Giving nothing away.

  She cast her eyes down the dashboard stats. Fitness tests, psych evaluations, after-action reports.

  “Stark is lead on this operation, correct?”

  Murphy nodded, his brow furrowing slightly, as though wondering if she was about to question the decision. “I think he’s ready.”

  She looked back at him, fixing him with a cool stare. “I agree.”

  Murphy’s smile seemed to falter for a second. Was that a slight tinge of jealousy? Faraday had been extremely impressed with Stark so far. He hadn’t put a foot wrong. For the first time, she sensed that her approval bothered Murphy, and as soon as the thought crossed her mind, she knew why that was. Stark was neither one of the old guard nor a green recruit eager to be taken under Murphy’s wing. He was his own man.

  “Good to be on the same page, as always,” Murphy said after a second.

  After he left, Faraday thought about Drakakis for the first time in a while. About his last moments in this office. The carpet had been replaced, but she knew there was a large, tear-shaped bloodstain on the floorboards beneath the spot where she was sitting. She could have chosen any other office, of course, but this one had the best view and was closest to the ops room.

  Faraday put her predecessor out of her mind and picked up the phone. She dialed a four-digit extension that put her through to a desk two floors below this one.